


grew up to be stardust

by iluvzuzu



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Trans Draco Malfoy, Trans Female Character, Trans Woman Draco Malfoy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-11
Updated: 2020-12-19
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:54:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,816
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24670366
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/iluvzuzu/pseuds/iluvzuzu
Summary: Hermione has been a rising star within the Department of Magical Law enforcement, but a Pureblood witch called Roanne Jowling is concerned that the Wizarding World's newly growing support of Muggleborns will lead to an oppressive Muggle takeover. Jowling has been writing incendiary pieces about Hermione's "background" in the Prophet, but is soon challenged by a rebuttal from none other than Malfoy, now named Cassiopeia, the newly transitioned reformed Death Eater who only wants to repay society and Muggleborn wizards for the wrongs she did as a teen. Harry doesn't know why, but this new Malfoy is now always on his mind... (TL;DR: Harry falls in love with trans girl!Draco and there's nothing any transphobes can do about it.) Title from Cassiopeia by Sara Bareilles.
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 19
Kudos: 55





	1. The Case Against Hermione Granger

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all been on twitter lately? Anyway, Roland Barthes was right!  
> Trans people are the gender they identify as. Period. Even if they don't pass, even if they transitioned late in life, even if they don't want/can't get hormones or surgery, even if they don't conform to traditional gender roles or clothing rules. Trans women are women. Trans men are men. Nonbinary people are nonbinary. Period. Intentional misgendering is violence. Intentional deadnaming is violence. You do not love or support trans people if you cannot see the truth of these things, and this is certainly not the story for you.  
> In this story, Hermione is Black; the Potter family is of Indian descent, making Harry mixed-race. He also has a beard. That's not really important, I just wanted you to know.  
> Warning for instances of deadnaming and misgendering.

THE CASE AGAINST HERMIONE GRANGER

by Roanne Jowling

The name Hermione Granger is, no doubt, familiar to most here in the Wizarding World. She is a Muggleborn who, despite her background, has made major headway at the Ministry of Magic, primarily in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. Her initial rise to fame occurred during the Triwizard Tournament at the onset of the Second Wizarding War, when she was first linked to Harry Potter, with whom she still shares a close relationship. 

She is currently being hailed as a maverick, a sort of icon of Muggleborn success. I will be the first to applaud her for all she has done for the Wizarding World, make no mistake. But now that Muggleborns are welcomed and honored in Wizarding society, isn’t it time to give the caution we have exercised against Purebloods a rest?

Hermione Granger insists that anti-Muggleborn discrimination still runs rampant in Wizarding Britain, which is understandable—when one has been through what she has, it’s easy to see hatred everywhere, even when the witches and wizards allegedly perpetrating it are well-intentioned. I will confess, I am one of those people Ms. Granger has “called out” for having been discriminatory against Muggleborns, simply because I am proud of my Wizarding lineage and afraid for the future of families like mine.

The idea that witches like me, who’ve been empathetic to Muggleborns for decades, ‘hate’ Muggleborns because they think magical lineage is real and has lived consequences - is a nonsense. I respect every Muggleborn’s right to live any way that feels authentic and comfortable to them. I’d fight with you if you were discriminated against on the basis of being Muggleborn. At the same time, my life has been shaped by being born a witch, raised a witch, and descended from a longtime Wizarding family. I do not believe it’s hateful to say so. If magical lineage isn’t real, the lived reality of witches and wizards from long standing magical families is erased. I know and love Muggleborns, but erasing the concept of lineage removes the ability of many to meaningfully discuss their lives. It isn’t hate to speak the truth.

So you see, I am not like the Blood Purists whom Ms. Granger rightfully fears. I have no wish to see Muggleborns dismissed, shut-out, or eradicated. I simply believe that being a leader in this community takes time. Muggleborns like Hermione Granger should understand that they have our support, but they simply can never understand the realities of having been part of this world their whole lives. We have been persecuted by Muggles throughout our history; that is a fact. So when someone from a Muggle family insists that we not only make space for her in our society, in our  _ government _ , but allow her to lead it? Yes, that scares me. Not because I ‘hate’ Muggleborns; but because I love the Wizarding World. 

Ms. Granger, call me a Blood Purist. Compare me to He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. I know you like to throw these words out to silence me, and people who share my concerns. I will not stay silent anymore.


	2. The Best of Us

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Malfoy responds to Roanne Jowling's commentary; Harry is informed of her gender transition and new name, Cassiopeia.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for instances of misgendering and deadnaming.

“I’ve got something to show you all,” Hermione said breathlessly as she entered Harry’s flat, where Ron and Ginny were playing a game of cards while Harry lounged on the sofa watching an old Quidditch game on his charmed telly. “It’s Cassiopeia Malfoy.”

“Who?” Harry said dimly, muting the game and racking his brain for any lost Malfoys he might have once heard of.

Hermione tsked. “You  _ know, _ ” she said. “She announced her gender transition last week in the Prophet.”

“Who reads the Prophet?” Ginny snorted. “I get all my news from Quibbler Online. Did you know they had a blog?”

“What the hell’s a blog?” Ron asked. 

“What’s a gender transition?” Harry added.

“How are you all like this?” Hermione moaned to no one in particular. “Ginny, the Quibbler isn’t real news. I know we all love Luna, but it’s just not a credible source. Harry, a gender transition is when someone changes their gender from what it was at birth, like someone who was considered a baby girl but later on feels like he’s a man and chooses to live his life as a man. That’s oversimplifying things, but you can do your own research later, I’m done doing homework for you.” This made Harry turn to Ginny with a sour expression, but Ginny was laughing at him. “Ron—” Hermione said, finally taking a breath and turning to where he was waiting expectantly. Hermione sighed. “We’ll talk about blogs later, alright? Anyway,” she continued, “Malfoy’s done something  _ incredible _ .”

“Malfoy?” Harry repeated. “ _ Our _ Malfoy? I mean,” he corrected, “you know what I mean. Malfoy as in  _ Draco  _ Malfoy?”

“She’s Cassiopeia now,” Ginny confirmed. “I read about it on Luna’s blog.”

“ _ Cassiopeia! _ ” Ron blustered. “Where does she get off?”

“What on earth do you mean, Ron?” Hermione snapped. “She’s transitioned, she’s allowed to change her name.”

“It’s just confusing,” Ron insisted, shaking his head. “Who cares what her name is? We all knew her as Draco—”

“Don’t call her that, it’s disrespectful,” Hermione hushed him. “It’s a boy’s name and she wanted a new one, what difference does it make?”

“Why  _ should _ it be a boy’s name?” Ron demanded. “When Charlie became a boy he didn’t change  _ his _ name.”

“Well, Charlie’s full name is Charlemagne, Ron, I suspect he always found it rather dashing,” Ginny cut in.

“I didn’t know people could do that, change genders,” Harry said, his mind reeling from this new piece of information.

“Even Muggles do it, Harry,” Hermione said reproachfully. “Honestly, the things you choose to overlook—”

“I’ve had quite a lot going on, Hermione,” he said dryly. 

“He just found out what geometry was like, three years ago,” Ginny added. 

“Yeah, Hermione, no one taught me geometry,” he said with a faux-pleading expression. “I was meant to know about gender  _ how _ , exactly?”

“So I suppose none of you knew that Helga Hufflepuff was also transgender,” Hermione said crossly, folding her arms over her chest.

“Did she change  _ her _ birth name  _ too _ ?” Ron cried.

“Why are you so hung up on names?” Hermione rounded on him. “You don’t even call Malfoy by her first name anyhow. Just keep calling her Malfoy and it’s like nothing’s changed.”

“Except she got kind of fit,” Ginny muttered to Harry, who laughed in surprise. “Don’t laugh,” she chastised, “I’m angry about it. I don’t know what she did but her hair’s incredible, it’s like a unicorn’s.”

“Is it?” Harry said with interest. 

“Anyway, Hermione, nobody really cares about that sort of thing in the Wizarding World,” Ginny said, ignoring Harry. “You just take some potions and get a little Transfiguration done a couple times a year when it starts to wear off. Simple.”

“Why she would change her name,” Ron was still muttering. “So pretentious.” 

“ _ Anyway _ ,” Hermione said with a glare towards Ron, “She actually came to my defense this morning. That hag Jowling wrote  _ another _ article about my ‘background,’” she sniffed, “and Malfoy’s written an rebuttal. Look!” She shook open the pages of the Prophet for them all to crowd around. 

THE BEST OF US

_ by Cassiopeia Malfoy _

I had been sixteen years old for just three weeks before I was recruited as a Death Eater by Lord Voldemort himself. I won’t deny that I was eager to join the ranks of my father before me (indoctrination, as many of us know, is a spell that can work harder and stronger than the worst of curses) but I must impress upon you how little of it was my choice or my family’s. My father had, of course, hoped that I would be a follower of the Dark Lord when I came of age, but even he never expected to see me used as a tool, a child soldier to infiltrate the institution that had housed and educated me for the past five years and allow my fellow Death Eaters to murder Headmaster Albus Dumbledore. Until the moment I faced off with Professor Dumbledore that night in 1997, I had fully believed what I had been told: That my purpose was to kill him myself. 

That night was the first time I realized the enormity of the situation. Voldemort was not giving me the opportunity to prove myself or be a hero for my people; he was hoping that I would die. A triple punishment: for Dumbledore, that he should have to kill or cause the death of one of his own students; for my parents, that they should always blame himself for my death; and for my memory, that I should always be seen in the eyes of the world as a coward and a failure. 

When I did not die, I became a hostage to Lord Voldemort in my own family home. I did not fight against him because I saw it as futile. I had lost all hope, all spirit. I operated only on instinct, and the instructions of my captors—namely, Voldemort himself as well as my aunt, Bellatrix Lestrange, both of whom were extremely capable wizards and masterful manipulators. The first time I felt anything that year was when Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, and Ron Weasley were brought to the manor as captives—and everyone knows how that story ended.

Though my family and I have personally wronged Hermione Granger on every level imaginable, she and Harry Potter were instrumental to proving my innocence at trial. Ms. Granger was the first to see me for what I truly was: Less than what everyone thought of me. I had been painted as a boy hero for the Death Eaters and a villain for every witch or wizard who opposed them. But I was neither of those things. I was a weak, malleable child who yearned for a place in our world. 

I was first denied a gender transition by my father at the age of five years old. Though gender transition is common enough in our community, my father was insistent that I remain male for the purpose of siring heirs for the Malfoy line. My mother, when I appealed to her, reminded me that since the Black name had died with her cousin Regulus (ignoring, of course, her disowned cousin Sirius who at that time was facing life in Azkaban), I was not only responsible for the continuation of my father’s lineage but hers as well. So I shut it off. From that age onward, I tried to do only what I was told was best for my family. You can consider me a fool for believing in them, but I would implore you to reflect on the things you have done at the behest of your own parents, aunts, and community leaders. 

Hermione Granger was the first person in the Wizarding World since Albus Dumbledore himself who saw me for what I was. She ensured that I paid for the wrongs I had done—you can read more about my partnership with the Department of Magical Law Enforcement in Auror Robards’ book,  _ Seeking the Dark: My Journey with an Ex-Death Eater— _ while also allowing me to recover from the wrongs that had been done to me. Her understanding of Wizarding law is unparalleled; her skills in nearly every magical discipline are exceptional; and her determination to see true and fair justice done is not only powerful, but rare. Roanne Jowling’s insistence that, because Ms. Granger doesn’t come from our world, she cannot truly be a part of it is not only prejudiced but wholly disprovable. Ms. Jowling implies that Muggleborn witches and wizards are allowed only on the fringes of our society, continually on probation to pay for the wrongs done to us by Muggles in the past—knowing all the while that if Muggles are the oppressors of wizards, then Muggleborn wizards will not be spared by them. 

Ms. Jowling’s entire premise is, to use her own words, a nonsense. She purports that her fear of Muggleborn witches and wizards is rooted not in hatred but in a legitimate fear of Muggle oppression; I cannot speak to how founded that fear is, but I undoubtedly can speak to this: Muggleborn witches and wizards are demonstrably not any less magical than the rest of us. They are not Muggles. They are  _ real witches and wizards _ , regardless of when they discovered their powers, regardless of how they were raised, regardless of their ability to assimilate into our society. 

I wouldn’t deserve the life I lead today if I were to allow anyone to believe that Ms. Granger is anything less than one of the greatest witches of our time. I have been to the Dark side and back, so trust me when I say that Muggleborn or not—and indeed, perhaps in part owing to the fact that she is Muggleborn—Hermione Granger is the best of us.

Ginny finished reading first, and leaned back in her seat, looking thoughtfully impressed. When Ron finished, he scoffed, but there was a quirk in his brow that seemed to imply doubt of his own cynicism. Harry finished reading last, because in the middle of every paragraph his eyes kept jumping up to meet those of Malfoy’s photograph, who periodically nodded stoically at him or else gave a firm, polite smile. When he looked up, all eyes were on him.

“Well, it’s nice to get a shout-out,” he said to Hermione with a shrug. 

Ginny laughed, breaking the tension. She nudged Ron and joked, “How does it feel to be a footnote?”

Ron rolled his eyes. “I’m  _ glad _ she didn’t say anything more about me, are you kidding? Imagine…”

“I don’t have to imagine, Ron, the whole article is about my influence on her life,” Hermione said hotly. 

“No, I mean, it was quite good,” he backpedaled, seeming earnest. “All the bits about you were great, and true, and stuff. I just meant—well, you know.” 

The four of them sat in silence for a moment, reflecting. “I suppose she means it,” Ginny said. “What does she have to gain from this? Jowling would have let her and her whole family off without a second thought. Lucius would be alive, Narcissa wouldn’t be who knows where…”

“And Malfoy would be some Pureblood bint’s husband, off siring heirs,” Ron said grimly. “Maybe she’s just manipulating the narrative so she can keep her gender.”

“I don’t think so,” Hermione frowned. “I think by the end of the war Lucius would have let her have whatever she wanted. The Malfoy name didn’t carry any power anymore, what would be the point?”

“I can’t believe I’m sat here feeling sorry for Malfoy,” Ginny said, shaking her head. “But now that she’s such a big fan of our Hermione, I suppose she’s good people.” 

“I  _ suppose _ ,” Ron grumbled, scrunching up his nose as Hermione aggressively kissed him on the cheek. 

“She really made some very insightful points,” Hermione began, and Ron groaned.

The three of them fell into bickering about just how nuanced Malfoy’s analysis of Jowling’s assertions had been, leaving Harry to stare absently at Malfoy’s photograph. He hadn’t thought of him—her—in years, not concretely. He hadn’t seen her in person since the trials, and by the time she had started her Wizengamot-ordered service at the DMLE, Harry had already quit the junior auror team. She still looked like herself, though, even ten years later and all womanly. Her pointed chin; cool grey eyes; straight, delicate nose. It was like she was made for this—not in the sense that she had always seemed feminine, which was beside the point, but in the sense that this was the first time Harry had ever seen her looking… confident. Malfoy had always been smug and self-obsessed but never so sure of herself. 

The photograph, as though sensing his line of thought, suddenly widened her smile and winked, sending a horrible, warm, swooping feeling through Harry’s entire gut. He haphazardly folded the paper up and tossed it away from himself as though it were on fire, before standing suddenly and announcing his need for breakfast. 

“It’s two in the afternoon, mate,” Ron snickered. 

“Well, I haven’t yet eaten, so it’s breakfast,” Harry insisted. “Who wants eggs?”

In the ensuing and rather hypocritical clamor for fried eggs, Harry watched as Hermione tucked the newspaper back into her bag and instantly felt cooled over.  _ Out of sight, out of mind. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Use of the name "Roanne Jowling" and any is intended to be satirical and parodic. The purpose of this work is to bring about my own personal catharsis following the trauma J.K. Rowlings comments have caused me as a queer person, not to in any way claim any characters or content of the Harry Potter franchise or to defame Rowling herself. I am merely commenting on words that she has publicly written.   
> I also hope that fellow members of my community can find joy and comfort in this work. This one's for my trans ladies and theydies <3 stay strong, go with pride.


	3. Velvety Elbow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Harry finally encounters Cassiopeia face to face..........

It was at Hermione’s promotion celebration that Harry met Cassiopeia in person. Well, he supposed, they had met before.  _ Once or twice,  _ he thought sarcastically to himself. But the opinion piece rebutting Roanne Jowling’s criticisms of Hermione had done the trick; Jowling’s legitimacy as a supporter of Muggleborns had all but been deconstructed and destroyed. There were unfortunately a number of wizards, including several Muggleborns, who had gone so long bowing and scraping to the Pureblood order that they still supported Jowling and turned their noses up at Hermione for being too big for her britches, but they had no effect on Hermione’s trajectory at the Ministry, and, by July, she was named Deputy Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement. 

“It’s all so exciting,” Hermione was gushing to Harry and Luna in the ballroom of some posh Wizarding hotel in Kensington, her cheeks pink with champagne and fluster. “I mean, I  _ really  _ hoped, but I never really  _ believed… _ ” Harry wasn’t really listening. He was scanning the room, knowing whom he was looking for but squashing the knowledge down and down and down to the pit of his stomach where it belonged. 

“I’ve heard Roanne Jowling has terfmites,” Luna was saying. “They’re little creatures that crawl into one’s brain through the ears and make one say the most foolish and embarrassing things…”

Ginny was across the room chatting closely with her date, a witch from a competing Quidditch team with whom she had had a well-documented rivalry until the news broke that they had actually been having an affair for some time. Now they were essentially the it-couple of the Quidditch world. Harry had been surprised but not displeased by this news; he’d been harboring a massive guilt over how he’d broken things off with Ginny for good at the end of the war, and seeing her happy with someone new warmed him rather than angering him.

Harry spotted Neville, then, who waved him over. He excused himself from Hermione and Luna as Hermione was saying, “It’s actually quite fascinating, the 1817 law that ended up being written out in only 1819…” 

Neville was sipping a butterbeer and looking distinctly tired but pleased. “Professor Potter,” he said jovially. 

“Professor Longbottom,” Harry returned. 

Neville flushed with pleasure. “How’s your summer been?” he asked. 

“Uneventful,” Harry said. “Philips and Boudini have been leading the summer term without much to report. I know McGonagall was anxious about the dormitory shifts but there hasn’t been any trouble.”

“I have to say, Harry, I’m so glad you did something,” Neville said seriously. “Thinking about you as a kid, about people like Lupin and Sirius Black who didn’t have proper families to go back to over summer… even I—” he broke off, shaking his head. “Anyway. Summer term is a great idea,” he said firmly. “The students need it.”

“Thanks, Neville,” Harry said, rather embarrassed. 

“I’m so glad for Hermione,” Neville said then, nodding over at where Hermione and Ron were being schmoozed by some of Ron’s old Auror pals. “That Jowling woman, what a piece of work.”

“Yeah,” Harry said, mind back on Malfoy and the rebuttal.

As if reading his mind, though it wasn’t a large leap to make, Neville said, “Wild about Malfoy, eh?”

“Yeah,” Harry said, really tuning in for the first time all night. “I didn’t even know people could change genders.” He’d done his research as Hermione had suggested and now believed he understood at least the very basics. 

“I don’t mean  _ that _ ,” Neville laughed. “I mean standing up for Muggleborns like that. I didn’t think she had it in her. I guess people really can change. Speak of the devil,” he added, nodding towards the door. “Look who’s here.” 

When Cassiopeia Malfoy entered, the conversation in the room dimmed, heads turned. She was wearing glamorous black dress robes with silver embroidery on the trumpet sleeves and sweetheart neckline. She smiled widely without showing teeth and made a beeline for Hermione, who shook her hands and seemed to even wipe away a tear as Malfoy inclined her head and said something that looked rather heartfelt. The conversation turned back to normal, but Harry couldn’t tear his eyes away. 

“Still quite posh, eh?” Neville noted. “Those robes look like they cost a hot galleon.” 

“Ron was cross about er— _ her _ —changing her name,” Harry said. “Is that not what’s done?”

“Well, it is unusual in the Wizarding world for someone to transition so late in life,” Neville said thoughtfully. “Normally if someone changes their name it’s before anyone has a real chance to know them as something else. But there’s a sort of magic to it,” he continued. “The repetition of saying the new name and the new pronouns acts as kind of a memory charm. You do it long enough and you start to forget they were ever anything else. Even me!” he laughed. “And you know I can’t remember anything.”

“Cassiopeia,” Harry said for the first time, trying it out in his mouth, surveying the witch with the shimmering white hair on the other side of the room, searching for any sign of his old nemesis in her radiant face.

“I expect it’s what she would have been called if she’d named a girl at birth,” Neville said. “That’s what a lot of people have done, as a sign of respect to their parents. Though it’s old-fashioned, I suppose. Then again, the Malfoys have always been old-fashioned people.”

Malfoy’s eyes slid from Hermione’s face to meet Harry’s, and he suddenly felt quite unsteady. “Er—” Harry said, breaking the contact to turn to Neville. “Loo,” he added by way of explanation as he all but ran out of the room. 

In the lavatory, he splashed water on his face, slipping his fingers under his glasses to rub at his eyes.  _ What was the matter with him? _ He had almost collected himself when someone entered. Harry looked up in the mirror to meet the silver eyes of Malfoy, and he choked, whirling around. “This is the men’s room,” he said stupidly.

Malfoy sneered. “That never stopped me before,” she said. Her voice was the same, maybe more lilted. “I saw you staring at me,” she said bluntly. “You want a  _ duel, _ or what? We’ve had our fair share of  _ that  _ in men’s rooms, don’t you think?” Harry swallowed. She smelled of a delicate perfume, something like flowers and fruit and summer; the scent crowded his senses, left sweat beading at his hairline. Malfoy tittered. “Good Morgana, Potter, it’s like you’ve never been alone with a woman before.”

Harry, to his own shock, cracked a smile. “It  _ has  _ been a while,” he said jokingly.

Malfoy’s eyes flashed as the hint of a smile ghosted across her pale pink lips. “I thought for a moment you were frightened of me,” she said offhandedly, moving to perch herself on the edge of the sink. Harry countered her motion and leaned against the wall opposite the door, unable to stop himself from watching her pale, slender leg peek out through a slit in her robes. He cleared his throat and forced himself to make eye contact. 

“Please, Malfoy,” he snorted. “When have I ever been frightened of you?”

She chuckled. “Not a once. That’s why I was interested to find out.” She tossed her long hair over her shoulder, exposing the pale length of neck that Harry knew had always been there but had never really noticed. “I like the beard, by the way,” she said, nodding her pointed chin towards his face. Instinctively, he raised a hand to it, feeling some overwhelming mix of pride and shame, knowing how unkempt he must look in the presence of someone like her. 

“Thanks,” he said, a beat too late. “I like your—well—you have a n—” he shook his head. “You’ve changed, too,” he finished lamely. 

Malfoy snickered. “Well said, Potter. Though it  _ is _ alarming to see how little your language skills have improved over the last decade, especially you being a professor now.”

Harry rolled his eyes. “I teach Defense, not— _ grammar _ ,” he defended. 

“Of course,” she said. They remained in silence for a moment, Harry fiddling with a loose thread on his sleeve and Cassiopeia examining her glittering silver fingernails. Harry was about to find some way to excuse himself when Malfoy murmured, “I’m so sorry, you know.”

His mouth went dry. “You—” he started, but couldn’t finish.

“For  _ everything _ ,” she said, softly but emphatically, looking up to meet his eyes. “What happened during the war. At the manor. The trials. Even before all that, even just at school, the things I—” she broke off, eyes glazing over as they moved to stare at the floor. 

“Oh,” Harry said, the back of his neck warming. He rumpled his hair and awkwardly reassured her, “If Hermione’s forgiven you, then I suppose I have. I always thought it would take her the longest.”

“Did you,” Malfoy said, not really a question. “I always thought it would be you.”

Harry’s heart was beating in his throat, echoes of voices from the ballroom ringing in his ears. “Nah,” he said, his voice rough. He cleared his throat, but the feeling didn’t budge. “I get it. I think I started seeing it the moment your mother saved my life.” 

Malfoy gave a little gasp, sliding off the sink and reaching to grip the edge of it with her hand. She was about to speak when some drunken Ministry wizard entered. “Whoopsie,” he said with a smirk, looking back and forth between Harry and Cassiopeia. “Occupied?”

“No,” Harry said when Malfoy didn’t speak. “We were just leaving.” 

“Well good _ night,  _ then,” the wizard said suggestively, already undoing the front of his robes as Harry led Cassiopeia by her velvety elbow out of the lav and into the corridor. 

She glanced at his hand on her arm and he quickly whipped it away, stepping backwards. “Sorry,” he muttered.

“That’s quite alright,” she returned. “You know, Potter, I…” she was looking back down the corridor towards the party, fingers on her delicate diamond earring twisting the gem absently. 

“Should get back, yeah,” he agreed, though he could see by the look on her face that that hadn’t been what she wanted to say. “Er… you go first. I’ll be ten steps behind you.”

Her gaze dropped and she nodded. “Thank you.” And he watched her go, her gait lithe and haughty as ever. He remembered suddenly that he was meant to be following her and launched himself into action, trying his best to regain composure before he crossed the threshold.


	4. Brunch at the Burrow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> At the Burrow, Harry learns a little more about the Wizarding World's takes on transition.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content/trigger warnings for: discussion of "medical" (magical) transition, trans reproductive capabilities, references to genitalia (though no anatomical terms are used), and talking about someone's transition methods and body while they aren't present. There is also a transition joke made by one cis person about another.

Sunday brunch at the Burrow three weeks later was a chaotic event. Fleur had announced her pregnancy, which put Molly into such a state that she’d burned nearly everything and was sobbing in her rocking chair while Bill comforted her bewilderedly. “You’d think she’d never had a grandkid before,” George muttered to Harry while they attempted to charm the scones back into dough to rebake them. 

Harry snorted, because this would, in fact, be Mrs. Weasley’s first grandchild. “Can’t we just scrape the burnt parts off?” he muttered back. 

“They taste like chimera shit, Harry,” Ron said through a mouthful of burnt bacon. “Not worth it, I say.”

“And the bacon?” Harry asked cynically.

“I’m starved,” Ron shrugged. “So it’s extra crispy, so what? Merlin, I am  _ not  _ prepared for if Hermione gets knocked up—”

“ _ Gets  _ knocked up?” Hermione interjected from where she stood at the stove, trying and failing to fry new eggs. “Who, exactly, do you think will be doing the knocking, Ronald?”

“Er,” Ron said, swallowing his mouthful. “I love you?”

Hermione narrowed her eyes at him but couldn’t stop her lips from twisting into a smile. “You’re lucky you’re cute.”

George and Harry whooped as Ron’s ears turned red. “Yeah,” George said thoughtfully. “I suppose Ron and Hermione are next, eh? I’m single as an ear on a ginger, and Ginny’s playing a whole new ballgame. I doubt Percy’s ever touched a woman, eh Perce?” 

Percy, at the end of the dining table, looked up from his conversation with Arthur suspiciously, but didn’t respond; Harry and George snickered and turned back to the deceased scones. “What about Charlie?” Harry asked curiously.

“I doubt Charlie’ll ever have kids,” George said. 

“Why?” he ventured, knowing it must be overstepping but not having the grace to care. "Is it because he's..." 

“I was thinking because he'd rather shack up with a dragon than have any sort of domestic life,” George said with a wave of his hand. “But I wouldn't be surprised if that's part of it, too. You don’t tend to ask your siblings about the state of their reproductive organs. But he started his hormone potions and transfigurations when he was—Merlin, must have been six, seven? And it was the seventies,” he added darkly. “Who knows what healers were snorting back then.”

“George,” Hermione said sternly, drying her hands on a dishtowel while Ron plucked an eggshell out of her curls. “I doubt even in the Wizarding world that’s polite to talk about.”

George shrugged. “When have you known me to be polite? And besides, Charlie’s open about it all. Plus, it’s Harry.”

Harry considered this information. “So that happens, then?” he asked when Ron and Hermione made for the dining table, carrying with them the gooey eggs and woody shards of bacon. “When you gender transition, or whatever. You can’t have kids?”

“I think a lot of people don’t want to,” George said, gnawing on the top side of a relatively unburnt scone. “When you get the Transfigurations, right? They change your downstairs. But it’s just cosmetic, you know. Wizards don’t know much about Muggle science, cells and all that, it’s kind of new to us. They can change the shape of things, but they can’t change what the parts do. Charlie couldn’t get anyone pregnant, for example. Though if he let his Transfiguration wear off and stopped his potions, he could probably  _ get _ pregnant. But people don’t often like to do that because it makes ‘em—”

“Dysphoric,” Harry supplied. “I read about that.”

“Yeah, sure,” George said. “Why the sudden interest? Are you wondering if womanhood is the right path for you, Harriet?” 

Harry grimaced good-naturedly. “If I were, I wouldn’t call myself Harriet. Ron would have a fit. But no, I’m not. It’s just something new to me; didn’t know there was anything left to learn.”

“Oh, of  _ course _ !” George said, smacking his palm to his forehead. “Malfoy’s just transitioned last month, that’s why you’re on this.”

“It’s not  _ because  _ it’s Malfoy,” Harry defended. “I’d just never heard of it!”

“It’s alright, Harry,” George said conspiratorially. “I’d be dyspeptic myself if my old war criminal school chum turned out to be  _ seventeen straight sickles. _ ”

“She’s not that fit,” Harry grumbled. 

“Who’s not that fit?” Ginny asked, joining them and snatching a somehow doughy and blackened scone and chomping into it. “This is shite,” she said, scowling as she swallowed. 

“Cassiopeia Malfoy,” George said. 

“Oh, no, she  _ is  _ that fit,” Ginny said. “Sorry to say, Haz. I mean, she’s probably a trainwreck, you’d have to be mental. We may forgive but who can forget—it would take all my fingers and toes to list the shit she’s pulled. The diary, the slugs—”

“The diary was Lucius,” Harry pointed out. “And the slugs were kind of on Ron. Or even Dobby if we trace it back far enough.”

“She jinxed Neville more times than even I know about,” Ginny said, as if Harry hadn’t spoken. “She called Hermione slurs, she made fun of your parents, she made fun of OUR parents—remember the fistfight you lot and Fred got into?—she got Buckbeak executed—”

“ _ Witherwings  _ is still alive,” George said, amused. “But I do happen to remember that particular quarrel, thank you. And she did kick Harry in the face that time that Tonks found him on the train.”

“Kicked Harry in the face!” Ginny repeated, throwing her hands up. “I could go on. I’m just saying. All the Death Eater stuff was inevitable, chalk it up to manipulation and hostage syndrome, but the rest of it… how someone could be so petty and cruel on a personal level…”

“How many people did you hex at school, by the way, Gin?” George asked innocently. 

Ginny snarled, “I’ll hex you right now if you don’t—”

“Oh! Just eat!” Molly called out to everyone through her tears. “I’ll make you all tea as well if you just stay and eat!”

“Will be taking her up on that,” George said dryly, making for the table. “What has one ear and hasn’t gone to the market in weeks?” He made a performance of jabbing a thumb into his singular ear and seated himself, murmuring some charm over the eggs to firm up the whites. 

Once they were all seated and Molly calmed, brunch was actually rather enjoyable, Harry thought. Everyone together, the family. There was something nice about that.

But eventually the time came for him to return to his flat. The sun was just beginning to set, late summer gold streaming through his west-facing windows and catching the whole place alight. He wasn’t hungry, exactly—Molly had made sure of that—but there was something in his gut that felt like hunger. It got that way sometimes, especially in summer when all of Hogwarts was on holiday and he had no classes or responsibilities. He’d done some consulting for the Aurors earlier in the season, which he did relatively often—the least he could do since they were so gutted to have lost him. “Really,” Head Auror Robards had told him at his goodbye party, “if the school doesn’t work out, there’ll be a place for you here, Potter.”—but was now solo until the start of fall term. It was reminiscent of loneliness, too, but then that wasn’t new; Harry had been lonely for so much of his life that he figured it was running in his veins at this point, a part of his body no less than his skin and lungs. But it was something else, too.  _ Something like hunger but not,  _ he mused,  _ something like loneliness, but not. _ He stood just inside his front door until the light from the windows receded across his floor, leaving him in a bigger patch of darkness every minute.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know a lot of this is can be very sensitive to talk about and read and I want to be respectful of that. If there is something in this chapter that you would recommend adding as a content/trigger warning please do let me know.   
> I also want to note that this story is now kind of being used as a way for me to ask "what if" about transition and gender in the Wizarding World, but I'm not intending to make any direct comparison between my imagined Wizarding methods of transition and real-world ones, and especially not to make any political statements on any form of transition. I want to make clear that what I've imagined for the Wizarding world does not represent any sort of idealized vision of what transition "should be" to me. I believe all forms of transition are valid; whether it's social, hormonal, surgical, etc, I believe that every individual should be able to do what feels correct for themselves.

**Author's Note:**

> Some of the content in the "Roanne Jowling" op-ed was copied and pasted directly from the twitter page of J.K. Rowling. I do not claim those words as my own and only repost them here as a means of parody and social commentary. The name "Roanne Jowling" itself is a direct reference to Joanne Rowling and is also intended to be satirical. I make no claim on the characters or any copyrights of the Harry Potter franchise.   
> Fuck transphobic people. Fuck women who attempt to cloak their transphobia in feminism. Transgender people enrich our society as a whole and the LGBT+ community specifically. Happy pride; we have trans women of color to thank for it.


End file.
